Friends in Surprise Places! This Pro-Israel Yale Professor Sounds a Powerful Call for Christianity to be Protected

Isaiah Narcisco : Mar 31, 2015
Gospel Herald

"Judaism has a message that every last human being needs to hear, but was unsuited to deliver it. Christianity was the chosen vehicle. [In fact, Christianity is] the most important gift mankind has ever received." -David Gelernter

(New Haven, CT)—Prominent computer scientist and Yale University professor David Gelernter wrote a column stating the case on why the Jewish people should care about the fate of Christianity in Europe. (Photo via Gospel Herald)

In his article for First Things, Gelernter argued that Jews should care about the role of Christianity in Europe, given that there was "a fundamental change in relations between Judaism and Christianity." He elaborated on the experience of his "mother's father," a rabbi who became friends with a minister in a church next to his synagogue in Brooklyn.

"Despite these admirations and friendships, the church as an institution angered him his whole century-long life," Gelernter wrote. "The twentieth was a century that centered, after all, on the murder of Jews. His best friends among non-Jews were not ministers but pre-Cultural Revolution liberals and progressives who hated anti-Semitism-and tended to dislike and distrust Christianity, too."

Although Jews historically did not trust Christians since the days of the Roman Empire, Gelernter contended that the events of World War II, along with the rise of Nazi Germany in the 1930s, changed that attitude.

"Naturally, Jews are among the leading historians of the Reich," Gelernter wrote. "As for non-Jewish historians, many or most are liberals-and the anti-Christian biases of liberalism grow louder all the time." (Photo via Wikipedia)

Gelernter claimed that the Nazis hated the concept of Christianity, even though German Christians failed to rise up against them, and practiced "state paganism" instead.

"They saw it as a form of weakness, as a Jew-concocted poison that had helped ruin Germany," Gelernter wrote. "Hatred of Christianity fed hatred of the Jews."

Gelernter's overall point was that many Christians have changed their attitude toward Jews since the dark days of World War II. He also managed to draw a line between criticizing the Israeli government and being outright anti-Semitic.

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